Chapter 2

*Explosion*

The Aerospace fighter flew low overhead shredding the ferro-titanium armour off the remnants of a Draconis Combine Mauler. It's quick, accurate and deadly volley of Streak Short Range Missile's shredding the Kuritan war machine, high explosive warheads detonating the Auto cannon rounds stored within its right torso.

The giant 90 ton war machine stood upright for a few seconds before collapsing to the ground, the pilot was knocked unconscious after receiving so much punishment. However, the pilot of one of the Clan mechs didn't leave anything to chance. she manoeuvred her Ice Ferret into position above the collapsed behemoth of a mech and sent a volley of fire from the arm mounted laser and particle cannon into the cockpit.

If the freeborn had survived the initial destruction of his machine, then that last shot Alexus put into the head of the Mauler should have finished the job.

She sighed, ‘Another world liberated from the pathetic Freeborn rulers of the Inner Sphere,’. She looked around, taking in the amount of destruction done to the civilian infrastructure.
‘but are we truly any better as Liberators than the aggressors we are trying to save this galaxy from? or are we just-‘. Alexus was cut from her train of thought as the computer alarms bleared in her neuro-helmet.

“WARNING!, Missile lock detected”, the female monotone voice chirped out.
Alexus jinked her small medium Omnimech on its right leg, the fast and strenuous move, causing some internal damage to the actuators and straining some myomer conduits. Ultimately the Ice Ferret avoided the double volley of Long Range missile that slammed into the ground she had been occupying a few seconds ago.

The computer spoke up once again “WARNING! Enemy detected. Targeting.... New target acquired”.

Looking to where her computer and radar indicated, she saw something that made herself shiver... but grin at the same time with anticipation.

Pushing the throttle stick on her command couch as far as it would go, she attempted to close the distance between herself and the Catapult support heavy Battlemech. The enemy Heavy attempted to bring her down before she could close, using its contingent of medium lasers to try and bring down the much smaller machine. as she approached the LRM dead zone, the pilot of the Catapult attempted another volley of missiles, a handful of the small guided explosives detonating across her frontal armour, something Alexus did not think the Free born had the skill to pull off at such a close range.

The Kurita Warrior then ignited his mechs jump jets and flew forward towards Alexus in an attempt to crush the much smaller Ice Ferret under its weight.

'Death from above...'

Alexus realised she was moving too fast to try and stop without sending her machine sprawling across the country side and possibly ending herself, so instead she turned her machine to face the mid air Inner Sphere warrior full on.

She aimed.

Then She pushed the firing studs, firing everything she had at the Kuritan mechs torso.

The cockpit temperature spiked, becoming almost unbearable, even with her cooling vest, the sweat drenched her body as her weapons fired off. Her extended range Particle Projectile Cannon impacted and melted the last of the armour off the already damaged left side of the Catapult, Her extended range medium laser hitting the same area. With most of the armour already gone from that section, the smaller energy weapon began cutting into the internal structure. However, the Streak SRM 2 launcher failed to lock on and missed the target going wide and detonating into the hillside the Catapult had jumped from.

Time seemed to slow as the catapult approached its inevitable impact; Alexus knowing that her death was imminent closed her eyes...

Only to be met by nothing...

She cracked open one eye to see the burning wastes of the city her Clan had captured, the Flag of the Draconis combine burning slowly above the local garrison's base.
As she turned her torso observing the destruction she noticed a small amount of debris, the debris pile kept growing as she turned her torso a full 90 degrees before changing her legs orientation.

Then she saw it.

The Catapult that had tried to crush her was lying on its side, along with a large blackened and rent hole where its side torso used to be. As well as shattered, burning cockpit. For the second time that day a smile touched her lips, a smile of triumph as she wiped the sweat from her brow.

Just before...

*Beep beep* “WARNING! Reactor Breach detected!” *Beep beep* "WARNING!” *Beep beep* the warning klaxons continued to sound off in her ear.

“whaaaa-!?“ was all Alexus managed to exclaim before the detonation.

A bright flash of light encompassed her vision and a burning sensation unlike anything she had ever felt before shot through her body. The burning, feeling like she had just been thrown into the local planetary star racked her body until.....

Date: 6th September 2014

Location: Ponyville

Local time: 11:37am

Light Spectre awoke with a scream, her rose red coloured coat soaked with sweat and her eyes blinking away tears.

“th-that dream again...” getting out of her bedding Light dragged herself over to the bathroom of her small apartment, her hooves making a quiet clip clopping noise as she proceeded towards her destination. She turned on the light in the bathroom and was instantly assaulted by the horrific image of her sleep deprived complexion, a sigh escaped her muzzle.

“Great... just great, and here I thought this Jelly mane stuff is supposed to help avoid situations like this” the mare groaned as she began the arduous task of styling messy mane coat back to a somewhat semi presentable state. Her navy blue and dark grey mane hanging loosely on her head, contrasted strongly against the colour of her coat in even in the darkness of her bathroom, turning on the sink and sticking her face under the cold running water helped to calm her nerves, it was not the first time she had that dream but it was also not the only one she had.

A few hours ago she had another nightmare where the giant metal monsters that seemed to dominate her dreams had brought forth unimaginable suffering on to the populace of Ponyville... her home, at least for the moment.

She knew not why she was having these dreams, nor what may stop them. She had tried magic wards provided to her by Princess Sparkle, the local Princess and magical wizz, but they didn’t work.

She had tried sleeping on clouds as Ponyvilles resident weather manager had recommended, Spectre still had the healing burn mark from when she had accidentally fallen through a thunder cloud. Although it hurt badly at the time of the strike, it provided her with something to chuckle about whenever she tried remembering moments after her... appearance.
The only things Light Spectre can remember from her whole life in Equestria were after she had crashed through one of the stained glass windows of the Royal palace a few months ago, it was there that the palace guard and staff had detained and diagnosed her with an extreme case of amnesia. her confused babbling and attempts at walking on her hooves after the crash had all pointed towards severe concussion, in the opinion of the medical staff present at the time.

The next issue presented itself when the doctors tried to find where she came from. 'It's amazing how much of a cluster buck their checks can be with with no cuttie mark for identification...' No relatives or next of kin could be found, as well as no registered home. this of course, got allot of attention as well as hushed rumours of possibly being a changeling scout of some sort...

most of these rumours where put to rest however once several magical scans took place, confirming that she was 'low and behold' a healthy Pegasus mare with a long life expectancy.

After those few days of confusion, no pony had any idea on what to do with her. But with some help from the local monarch, Princess Celestia. Light was able learn to walk like normal again... well as normal as others would see her.

She was also re-taught in the Ponyville rehabilitation centre under the care of a Mrs Twilight Sparkle, how to use her feathered wings for flight, she wasn't the best flier in the world but she could carry her own weight as a substitute for the local weather team. Quickly finishing up with getting herself cleaned up she decided to take a glance at the time on her digital... clock

11:58AM. . . . .

“...” she stared for a while... bewildered, before realisation hit her like the late express train on its way to Canterlot.
Her eyes widened and she bolted for the door.

“OH BUCK, I’M GONNA BE LATE!” Quickly throwing on a saddle bag, she shot out the door as fast as she could, unfurling her wings she prepared to take flight into the morning skies of the quint town. But of course, the inexperience in flying combined with a parcel hitting her in the head multiplied by gravity resulted in her spinning out of control and crashing into the coffee table of a familiar group of ponies.

'Pony feathers...'

*CRASH* *SHATTER* *CRASH*

the Elements of Harmony looked onto the crashed form of Light Spectre with a large amount of shock.

“....”

“....”

“....”

“....”

“wha-”

“Hay Look, its Lighty! Haya Lighty” Pinkie Pie exclaimed as Light began to regain her senses.

“uugh... Hi Ms Pie” she winced as she felt the area on her head that connected with the oak wood table, no bleeding but there is defiantly going to be a large lump later on. Glancing around Light also noticed the rest of the Elements looking at her with mixture of emotions the most prominent one being surprise.

“Umm... Hi Light Spectre, so... to what do we owe you dropping in?” Light Spectre almost froze after being asked that by Twilight.

'Did the Princess just... make a... horrible pun!?' Light shook her head clear.

Rainbow was the first to break from her shock and fall straight into a bout of laughter "hahaha heheh", after a few seconds she calmed down. "y-your learning Twi, keep it up and you might end up being as good at jokes as me"

“heh... yeah" Spectre chuckled painfully "kinda did drop in on that one didn't I?” Suddenly she heard a noise she thought she would never be more scared of in her young life, the clock tower of Ponyville began to ring signalling that it had just reached high noon.

“No, no, no! I am so dead!” Light bolted up out of her prone position and tried to fly off, but stabbing pain lanced at the base of her wings causing her to yelp.

Rarity was the second to recover from the destruction of their lunches due to the kinetic, organic missile now starting to pull her injured self up out of the wooden table wreckage. “well that was quite... unexpected” Rarity stated as she levitated her now destroyed tea cup up to examine, wincing as she realises the cup was beyond saving. "I'm sure it wasn't too expensive..."

“Wow Spectre. your wings look banged up worse than that time I flew through Applejacks barn window during cider season," Rainbow stated as she observed one of Light Spectre's badly bruised wings. The usually red fur covered joint starting to show colouration of blue and black. "I think you might want to get that checked out..." She helped the still slightly dazed Pegasus up right.

"I Don't need to get checked out, I need to get going" She grumbled out in response to Rainbow Dash.

Grunting, Light Spectre abandoned the idea of flying and decided on racing away to her destination on hoof. "Sorry about the mess and all girls! I'll pay for it later, I swear!" kicking up a cloud of dust in the process and ignoring the Element bearers as they called after her.

“Light Spectre wait, you left your bags here!” Twilight called, receiving no response back from the pony as she disappeared off into the distance. She decided to place the abandoned saddle bags onto her back and return them to the Pegasus as soon as possible.

Looking over to the five of her friends, twilight voiced what the others were similarly thinking at that moment. “Come on girls; let’s go see what’s got our friend so worked up... other than being late for something” with this all but one of the Mane Six began their brisk walk after the hectic mare.

“I’m sorry super sweet delicious strawberry cupcake... but I wont be able to enjoy your fruity taste for now” Pinkie quickly pushed herself to look in the direction of her friends, her mood becoming serious. “because I’ve got a friends emergency to fix!” with that said Pinkie's mood took a 180 degree turn and she started happily bouncing after the rest of the group. However, just as she landed the sixth bounce of her happy stride she was struck by multiple leg and tail shakes followed by both her forelegs getting an itchy knee’s which was then followed by a huge smile spreading across her face as she resumed her bounce after her friends.

'Ooooooooo, Lighty's gonna have such a big surprise!'

Date: Calculating... Unknown

Location: Calculating... Unknown

Time: Calculating... 22:18

“Ughhh, my head” Nathan grunted groggily as he undid the restraints and pushed himself off the chair he was in. His vision was blurred considerably, so as he looked out the observation deck all he could make out was the rough shape of the jumpship.
It was not a pretty sight.

The nose of the ship was executing a slow spin as if something has smashed into the doomed vessel, this was further enforced by the way the ships nose was unaligned and unattached with the rest of the vessels body. Along the hull of the star ship where areas of shredded metal, so bad where the scares on the once interstellar ship that it looked as if someone had decided to go too town on the hull of the ship with some over sized shotgun.

Nathan went to swear again, but something caught his attention. A globule of blood floated past his vision, quickly he began checking himself over for injury. He moved a hand to his head only to pull it away feeling the sticky wet substance steadily leaking from the back of his cranium.

Nathan was now floating through the observation deck with a possible concussive injuries and no idea if anyone else survived.

“Perfect... just perfect” Nathan pushed himself away from the non damaged observation window and began to try and open the doors that kept him from his hopefully still breathing comrades and the greater supply of recycled air on the other side. The door didn’t budge...

“Great father, the one time that we planned to return home for some rest and this happens!” Nathan continued to tug at the door for a few minutes before letting go and deciding to allow himself the zero gravity movement across the room.
A light beeping grabbed his attention, turning his head about and seeing the oxygen monitor on the side of the room reaching critical levels.

"So some systems are still working..."

he started thinking about all that happened in his life. From his failure in his first trial, too the first time he went on a mission with his new comrades whom he owed his life too, Nathan went through all the memories.

'So this is my life flashing before my eyes hmm?... It would be wrong to lie and say I wasn't expecting more of a spectacular show' he began to breathe more steadily as oxygen in the room became more and more scarce.

Nathan's vision started to blur as more and more of the precious oxygen supply began to run out.

‘No!, now is not the time for sentimentality! I refuse to die here like this!’ Nathan spun around in the 0G environment, grasped the doors that had imprisoned him in the observation room.

With all of his remaining strength he pulled, and pulled, until finally...

The door budged by about an inch, this allowed more oxygen to flow into his enclosed space. With a few more precious minutes of air secured Nathan started to think about his next move. ‘Sit here and hope someone survived? Or try and force my way out? So many choices...’ It was at that moment he looked up, and the universe heard a face palm unlike none other.

“w-what...?” Nathan voiced as he stared dumbfounded at what he had seen.

Twisting around once again he placed his feet on the back of the seat he woke up in and pushed himself towards the ceiling, grunting as he grabbed a hold of the shut steal vent of the ventilation system, he then proceeded to pull out the pocket knife he had acquired from Exodus during their scuffle and started to undo the screw that held the sealed vent in place. ‘I wonder how our fearless leader is handling this situation right now.’. He undid the last screw and bolt and pulled the sealed vent off leaving it to float about the room, he then proceeded to pull himself into the tight passageway and began to pull himself through.

“for all of our sakes, he best be alive and well enough to come up with a plan to get off of this dead hulk or magically come up with an idea too fix it” he said to no one in particular as he made his way through the ventilation system towards what he thought was the elevator shaft that would lead him to the Mech bay.

He had a gut feeling this is where he would find Exodus and others from his company, a familiar piercing cry of pain reverberating through the vent system from the direction of the bay further enforced this idea as he continued to Navigate in its direction.

Author's Note

Phantom: firstly, id like to apologise for not updating this fic for around a year. life combined with studies and extreme case of me not liking anything I thought up and started to doubt the original plot line I had come up with. Stuff kind a got hard real quick. ^^;
???: an un-countable number of other excuses, Blah blah, blah....
Phantom: Here is Le second chapter! ^^ *eye twitch*
???: an entire year and all you have to show for it is just over 3,000 words, very impressive
Phantom: Oi! stop judging me, and stop shaking your head in disappointment! you as well reader, give me a hand here! ;_;
???: well at least you've started to advance on the plot, however... did you really have to make Nathan out to be so unprofessional for a Clansmen?
Phantom: LEAVE MAH LOVABLE CLANNER ALONE!! ;c
???: *Sigh...* hay you. yes, you the reader. do you see what I have to put up with?
Phantom: I'm not that bad! your the one causing conflict here! D:<
???: why are you shouting?
Phantom: because... you know what. buck this shit, I'm out.
???: Hay, Where do you think your going?
Phantom: to play some Mechwarrior Online... why do you ask?
???: you need to get to work on Chapter 3, or do I just shred up the stuff you've already done and not bother reminding you?
Phantom: *Exasperated sigh* ok ok, im doing it... Jesus Christ, bloody mare is a pain in my ass-
???: the hoof Phantom. you remember the pain dont you?
Phantom: *gulp* ^^; *slow nod*
???: good, then get back to work, you can play once this is finished
Phantom: Help. me ;-;